Manualstuck
by CanDoAnythingNow
Summary: In a different universe-a branch off of ours, in fact-something was created. Something terrifying: Homestuck units. Join with Erin Vandelheim as she faces the terror that is the trolls and the children, with the task of keeping her sanity. Rated T for language Gamzee, Karkat, etc.
1. Chapter 1

I sighed boredly as I searched the internet. _Homestuck cosplay… Homestuck cosplay… why are you so elusive at times?_ I thought boredly, wincing as my headache got the better of me… again.

Who am I, you ask? Just your average nineteen-year-old girl, who lives alone in a rather-nice house in Northern California! I worked as a tour guide in the semi-nearby Redwood Forest; however, I was on break due to it being winter. I was even looking at other jobs, such as working in a café or something!

But back to the matter at hand. I was searching cosplay for my favorite fandom ever—Homestuck. I had regularly been told that I acted much like a couple of the characters but looked more like others—I blamed my short black hair—and thus I had read it all. So amazing. So good.

Suddenly, a page caught my eye. _Homestuck units_… I pondered, wondering what in the world a "unit" was. Shrugging, I clicked on the link. Suddenly, a bunch of brightly flashing lights aggravated my terrible migraine—I was sick, after all.

"Holy motherfucking miracles…" I muttered, nearly falling out of my chair. I finally dared to look at the screen which had appeared to have calmed down.

It read as followed:

"Congratulations! You are the ONE MILLIONTH visitor!

"Your location has been determined as: California, Eureka city, 4064 Campton Road, name ERIN LIAM VANDELHEIM. Homestuck units: TROLL! and KID! bundle will be sent to this location within two business weeks.

"Please be at this location to sign for these deliveries, as the nature of this shipment is highly volatile and cannot be left outside of a residence.

"Have a nice day!"

I blinked a few times before having the sense to take a screenshot of the popup. Right after I did this, it vanished. I tried to post the shot into MS Paint; however, it failed and remained the same.

Shrugging it off as a mirage created by my sickness-addled mind, I turned off my computer and went to bed.

The next week passed by rather quickly, with me forgetting the "delivery" utterly and, thankfully, getting over my head cold. I attempted to apply for a job at a nearby movie theater, but most likely failed. I stuttered quite a bit and my hands shook considerably. At this rate, I would never get a good, regularly-paying job.

After going home that night and attempting to avoid thinking of my horrible financial situation—really, the only reason I was able to afford this house was because it was my late, rich parents' vacation home—by watching _Braveheart_ for possibly the fiftieth time. At this point, I could quite easily fall asleep in the goriest of scenes—which I proceeded to do.

At roughly ten in the morning the next day, I was awoken quite suddenly by the doorbell ringing. It didn't help that the couch I had fallen asleep on was in the main living room, right next to the front door. I managed to pull myself off of the couch, stumbling to the front door.

And there was a rather-large box there, with a delivery man wearing an Astra Inc. uniform.

Huh.

Forgot about this.

I blinked at the man, my messy hair probably being a wreck—like normal. He cleared his throat before speaking.

"Delivery for an, uhh, Erin V…" he trailed off as he read my last name. I shook my messy hair out of my eyes.

"That's me. Aren't I supposed to sign?" I tried to say politely; it was hard, though, as I had only gotten around six hours of sleep.

"Yeah… here you go miss…" he said, handing me the signature pad. I gave my rather-doctor-ish signature and passed it back to him. He took it and left, leaving me with what I now realized was two boxes.

"Let's see… I got "Homestuck" units… judging by how big this box is, I'm assuming it isn't a kid." I muttered to myself before grabbing the manual.

GAMZEE MAKARA: Unit Guide and Manual

"Motherfuck…" I muttered to myself before generally pushing it inside, stopping in the small mudroom as there were steps leading to the rest of the house. I went back outside for the other box, shivering as a cold wind blew through my thin pajamas. Once I had both boxes inside, I closed the door and began to read the manual.

"So, they have a section on how to wake him up but no actual methods… yay…" I quietly said, glancing at the box that presumably contained the psychopathic juggalo. I thought for a second before snapping my fingers. "A couple honks should wake him up!" I quickly hopped over Gamzee's… box… and grabbed a pair of scissors to open the non-unit containing box. Upon opening it, I found myself confronted by a… dehydrated recuperacoon? Huh… should probably get that ready before he wakes up… I took the one-foot by one-foot dark red block to the sink, where I poured some water over it; it began to expand ever so slowly and I quickly took it down to the basement and set it in a corner. _He can have the basement…_

I went back to the small box, where I found a… husktop? Lots of clothing? Makeup? Seeds? A greenish card? And… bicycle horns! Man, how did this all fit in here?

I took out one of the horns and, carefully standing at arms reach, gave it a few tentative "honks". A faint rustling sound could be heard from the crate, as I now realized it was. I honked the horn a few more times before chucking it into the pile… where it set off a giant honking chain reaction.

The top of the box proceeded to be carefully removed by a gray arm; I fled into my house away from the mudroom, screaming quietly.

"Hang on a motherfuckin' second! Can't a motherfucker get out of a box?" a strangely drawling voice called from behind me. I screamed a bit louder and proceeded to trip on a random book, falling flat on my face.

"Oww…" I quietly muttered, rolling onto my back… to be confronted with Gamzee standing nearly on top of me. "Ack! Personal space, personal space!" I cried this out before quickly crawling into the next room.

"Wait a motherfuckin' second!" he called after me, easily overtaking my slow crawling speed. Damn… he was tall…

"What?" I snapped back before sitting on the cool tile of my kitchen.

"You're bleeding."

And he was right; when I had fallen, I had caused a random nosebleed. I proceeded to blush and stood up, heading over to the sink.

"Thanks…" I muttered, washing some of the blood from my face. He made a non committal noise before walking away. I turned off the water and just stared out the window.

I lived nearby the edge of my town, Eureka. This window overlooked an undisturbed stretch of wilderness. Barely anyone visited; it was better this way. The only time that I really ventured out was to get a job or to work at my job, and the occasional grocery trip. Canned food didn't taste that bad, after all.

However, from how it looked, I'd have to go out much more often. Not many had the taste for canned food that I had, so I'd probably have to shop for Gamzee's food. I wonder what he'd eat… the manual had said something about not eating his pies, so that was something to avoid.

Deciding I'd ask him, I set the towel I had been absently clutching onto a countertop. I peered around the house; he wasn't in my immediate view.

Carefully stepping out, I went over to the mudroom. It appeared that Gamzee had taken his two boxes and the absurd pile of horns somewhere else. Shrugging, I went to the basement.

Ahh, there he was.

It looked like he was attempting to strew the horns across the floor; I decided to properly introduce myself.

I began to walk over to Gamzee, but proceeded to step on a horn, causing a loud honking sound, which freaked me out enough to fall over onto another horn. He also freaked out and immediately turned around, pulling a juggling club out of nowhere before realizing it was me. The club proceeded to vanish just as quickly as it had appeared as he began to walk over, using a shuffling gate to avoid honking any more horns.

By the time he had reached me, I had pulled myself into a sitting position and was moving some horns away from me. He grinned and plopped himself a few feet away from me, avoiding sitting on a horn. I watched him out of the corner of my eye, letting my long-ish bangs cover my eyes. He was distantly staring off with a glazed look while slowly honking a horn.

Truth be told, it was quite terrifying.

I settled to read the manual which had remained in my clutched grip somehow for this entire time.

And proceeded to curse out loud.

"Motherfuck. I have to send you to… how old are you?" I asked, looking directly at the troll.

"I'm six sweeps, motherfucker. Or, in motherfucking human years, thirteen." He said simply, wearing a broad grin. I slapped my forehead.

"Junior high, then, unless… what part of the human calendar would you fit in, like what day is your birth-slash-wriggling day?" I asked, pulling my knees closer to my chest.

"Ehh… I guess I'd be in motherfucking December or something…" Gamzee drawled, leading back and causing a random horn to honk. I rolled my eyes; normally, I would facepalm, but I was trying to grow out of that habit.

I slapped myself in the eye by accident once.

Anyhow, I thought for a few minutes. _Gamzee's birthday… time to think of a random day that fits into Capricorn, I guess_… I thought, before having one concern.

"When IS it Capricorn, anyway?" I wondered out loud, seeing as he would most likely _be_ one of his own symbol.

"It's like, late December to the middle of motherfucking January…" he drawled even more, rolling onto another horn. Now he was looking at me. It was actually… not that terrifying.

At least he was still stoned.

… I needed to get him some pie tins FAST.

"So… I'm gonna say your birthday is January… fifteenth. Good enough for me; ides of… January. Close enough." I finally muttered, my dark hair falling in my eyes.

"… hey…" he said after there had been a sufficiently awkward pause.

"… yeah?" I responded after a bit, tilting my head as I looked at him.

"What's your motherfuckin' name, bitchtits?" he asked, resting his head on an arm.

"Oh… Erin…" I responded, trailing off a bit. He made a non-committal noise before yawning.

"What kind of motherfucking food do you have around here… Erin?" he asked, quite civil really. Even if he was cussing left and right.

"Umm… some stuff… and some other stuff… what do you like to eat, other than pies?" I asked, needing something useful. _Looks like I'm going grocery shopping… lovely…_

"Ehh… fruit… and fish, I guess." He replied, surprising me a little. _Then again, he DID live on the coast…_

"Ok; I was going to go to the grocery store soon, anyway. In the meantime, I'm pretty sure I've got some fresh fruit upstairs, if you'll follow me~" I got up and dusted imaginary dust off of my… pajama pants.

Yeah, I was still wearing those… and they had polka dots on them… talk about awkward much…

Attempting to feign away any idea to Gamzee that wearing pajamas wasn't normal, I wandered upstairs…

And tripped on the stairs.

I got up, feeling that I should have been warned about the stairs (even though it was my house) and my ego a little bruised; Gamzee snickered a bit behind me, causing me to blush. I scurried up the stairs as fast as I could without tripping a second time, and quickly walked over to the kitchen.

In my kitchen, there was my trusty sink which was across from my even-trustier refrigerator and handy-dandy microwave.

On top of said reheating device was a simple fruit bowl, which had some apples, some bananas, some peaches, and some other various fruits.

I plucked a peach, a nectarine, an apple, and a banana out of the bowl. I quickly washed all of the fruits which needed it and turned to leave the kitchen… to realize that Gamzee had been following me in the kitchen.

"Ack!" I spluttered and fell over right in front of him… or would've, if he hadn't caught me… talk about awkward, much…

"Watch yourself, motherfucker…" he murmured as I regained my balance—really, I swear I'm normally coordinated!—and then let me go before grinning at the assortment of fruits. "Are all of those for little ol' motherfuckin' me? You shouldn't have, ya little motherfucker!"

If anyone else had called me that or if anyone had said it in a different tone, they would be missing fingers.

But the way he said it made it seem like the word wasn't normally considered an insult; rather, it was an _affectionate_ term.

I tried to shrug it off and instead put on my game face. "Yup! Here ya go; this one's mine, though!" I said, offering all but the very-ripe nectarine. I loved those.

He took the three offered fruits and examined them, very curious. He didn't seem to recognize them, how adorable! Gamzee then tried to nibble on peel of the banana. I giggled before taking it away from him. I carefully began to peel the banana, but as I did that, Gamzee started to stare in horror before running away with the apple and peach.

I stared; he stared back from the room next to the kitchen.

I looked at the banana before cracking up laughing.

"Really? You think a banana looks like… Jesus, man!" I managed to snort out between laughs, holding the half-peeled banana in my hand. And that was the moment when I learned that laughter was very, _very_ infectious as he began to laugh—and honk—with me.

I threw away the banana; truth be told, I hated them and had no idea why one was in my house. He turned to eating the peach, as it was apparently "very motherfuckin' sweet and got all the yummies up in here". That got me to laugh even more, to the point that I nearly choked on my nectarine.

After the amazing incident with the fruits, I went over to my couch and amazing television that my old boyfriend had bought for me. The sucker—he was rich; of _course_ I'd use the "gifts" he bought for me _long_ after I dumped him.

I turned on the large plasma-screened television; it was almost always on some "immature" cartoon that I adored. This time, it was an episode of _Adventure Time_, the second one with the Flame Princess.

I then proceeded to flip over the back of the couch right into a sitting position on the couch _like a boss_. Gamzee snickered as he simply flopped over the arm of the couch, watching the cartoon with me.

It was… peaceful.

**A/N: Yeah, I'm writing Homestuck fanfiction. And yes, I tracked down manuals.**

**I'm probably not gonna be working on One Against One Hundred any more (boohoo whatever) but I'm gonna be working on this.**

**I own nothing except Erin; I don't even own her house (which is a legitimate house in Eureka, CA where I don't live ;D).**

**The Homestuck manuals were created by invisiblecanada, who will get a link to this. :D but really, she only made eight out of the twelve trolls and I wanna do the kids too :c so if any of you adoring fans wanna write manuals… ;D**

**And I'm gonna have authors notes down here o3o so yeah**

**By the way, Erin is in no way related to any character from any of my other stories, so yeah xD**

**Banana jokes are funny 8D**

**Why are you still reading this? o.o**


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N: Disclaimer: I do not own Homestuck, Braveheart, Troll Romance Drama, Minesweeper or anything relating to computers. I vaguely own my brain and ideas, but hey, they might still belong to my parents.**

A couple of days passed. Not much happened; I did, however, get from Gamzee what trolls tended to eat, and made parallels to what there was in stores.

While we were trying to figure it out, it was a bit funny.

~Flashback~

"_Humans DON'T HAVE grub sauce!"_

"_Well why the motherfuck not?"_

"_BECAUSE WE A: DON'T USUALLY EAT BUGS AND B: DON'T EAT OUR YOUNG! I'm getting ketchup, mustard, and mayo."_

~End Flashback~

Still, I found good parallels—meat is meat, right?—and Gamzee had approved. Hopefully the next troll I got would also approve.

However, the cost of the trip had set me back a pretty penny—food was _expensive_ and I had no income. Still trying to find a job, but… it wasn't looking too good.

Maybe I could FINALLY gain access to my parent's bank account… nahh, it probably wouldn't happen.

A girl could dream, though.

A sudden sound knocked me out of my reverie. A doorbell. Well it _had_ been close to a week, but still…

I wandered from my bathroom, where I had been just sorta… blankly staring at myself… downstairs to the mudroom. I went through the mudroom—which Gamzee had cleaned, thank you very much—and opened the door. Speaking of Gamzee, I assumed he was in the basement, either asleep or passed out; they were the same thing, right?

I looked at the delivery—two boxes yet again—and then at the delivery man. I signed the pad before examining the manual.

KARKAT VANTAS: Unit Guide and Manual

"What the… hey, where are you going!" I muttered before realizing that the delivery man was back in his truck and leaving. "Best customer service _ever_," I muttered sarcastically before pushing the box that _presumably_ held the unit into the mudroom.

"Waking him up, waking him up… hey, there's actually a section on how to get him to wake up! Leave him with Gamzee… gah…" I murmured to myself as I kicked in the other box. I opened the smaller box and pulled out another dehydrated recuperacoon—this one was purple, how girly—and set to pouring some water on it and placing it in another corner of the basement.

While I was in the basement, I found that Gamzee had passed out, face-first, in a pie. This was actually quite typical of him and, after figuring that it wouldn't KILL him, I left him to his own devices.

As it was, he was too peaceful-looking to wake up, so I'd have to find a different way of waking up the perpetually-annoyed troll.

I went back to the smaller box and pulled out… clothing, a green card, a flash drive, a husktop, a… DVD? Book? Sadly enough, both of said entertainment devices had horribly long names that were written in the Daedric alphabet, Troll-fashion. In short, I couldn't tell what either was about. But I could guess.

"Urgh… stupid rom-coms…" I muttered, pushing both away from me with my foot. Suddenly, my phone rang. I wandered back out of the mudroom into the kitchen where I grabbed the phone mindlessly and hit talk along with speaker phone.

"Hello?" I asked, leaning against Karkat's crate.

"Hey, Erin…" a familiar voice said. I froze, not even daring to look at the phone.

"Will, we broke up. We're over." I tried to say with malice, but it failed, and sounded terrified. He chuckled.

"I know you were just joking then; listen, I've got a couple of tickets to go on a cruise to Fiji—we could talk things over then." He continued, drawling and sending shivers up my spine.

"I'm not interested, Will. Stay away from me." I finally said, managing to get my voice under my willful control.

"But I thought you said that you loved me, Erin, and that you'd go to the ends of the earth with me." He said, quoting something that I had said when I had been madly in love with him.

Before my parents died.

Before he thought of me as an "average poor girl".

Before the belt came down for the first time.

Before I finally ended all contact with him.

I drew a shaky breath. "I'm not interested in you any more, Will. I was young and stupid then. We aren't anything anymore. Stay the fuck out of my life. I've moved on past you and have absolutely no need for you in my life." I managed to say with some determination. I _wasn't_ weak anymore. _I_ _didn't_ _need anyone_.

He sighed. "If you truly think that… I won't be there for you to fall on anymore, you know."

And he hung up.

What the actual fuck?

The creep…

Suddenly, I became aware of the feeling that someone was watching me… and I turned around.

Karkat had, at some point in the conversation, pulled the top off of his crate and was staring at me with a "dafuq chick?" expression. I stared back, rather blankly, before slowly raising my right hand in a Vulcan salute. He face palmed.

"What?" I calmly asked, dropping the salute. He grumbled something before beginning to rant.

"Who the fuck are you, shitsponge? You know what, don't answer that. Where the fuck am I?" he began to rant, and appeared like he would continue ranting if I hadn't flailed my arms and legs in his general direction.

"Whoa whoa whoa! STOP. YOU'RE SPEWING ALMOST NONSENSE." I managed to splutter out. He rolled his eyes at me; I rolled my eyes back. "I'm Erin, you're in California, yadda yadda, your recuperacoon is in the basement. Are you hungry?"

He blankly stared at me.

Did I break him or something?

"… how can you be so fucking HAPPY after someone you're so obviously black for is fucking obviously red for you, dumbfuck?" he finally said. Now it was my turn to stare. _Oh yeah… he's a romanticist-person-thingie… great…_

"Oi. Don't try to fix my love life. Neither of us is flippin' quadrants." I finally said after figuring out _what_ to say. He rolled his eyes and scoffed at me before hopping out of the box.

I stood up and nearly fell down again… with laughter. _Mother of Gog… Karkat's shorter than me… then again, I'm six years older and rather tall, BUT STILL…_ He glared at me; I shut up.

"Um… some of your stuff is in the basement… if you'll so kindly follow me… I guess I'll carry your stuff…" I quietly said, picking up the pile of clothing, cards, and romance items… wait, what about the husktop and flash drive? Ehh, I could come back for those. Karkat muttered some curse word and picked up the last two things, though, so it didn't look like it'd be any problem. As I carefully walked to the basement, I could hear honking.

And so could Karkat.

And apparently, the units were based _after_ Gamzee's little… flip-out.

So Karkat basically flipped out.

"What the fucking Mother Grub? WHY IS HE HERE?!" he started basically screaming. I stared at him for a few seconds before diving behind a chair. He had pulled out a random sickle and was flailing it wildly.

"P-please stop waving that sickle—I don't wanna die!" I wailed, sticking my head out. He turned back to me.

"Fucking make me, bonebulge sucking nooksniffer!" he snarled at me before heading into the basement.

"Oh fuck, oh fuck, someone's gonna die and it's gonna be messy…" I began to wimper before crawling into the kitchen. _If Gamzee snaps I wanna have a knife at the ready…_

And then I heard laughing. I facepalmed; of _course_ he would realize that he's already shoosh-papped… time to go cull myself.

After finally taking the phone out of the mudroom, I gather my (pitifully small amount of) courage and ventured into the basement. They were sitting together, in a pile of… bicycle horns. Wait, were they having a feelings jam? Time to socially-awkward penguin out of here…

Despite the fact that I had barely peered into the basement and that I was creeping near-silently back upstairs, they heard me. Karkat got up, muttering something under his breath, but the cacophony of honks covered up me running up the stairs and quickly closing the door. I padded across the floor to the kitchen, where I flung out ingredients for making… cookies. Ehh, it would do… I could make it look like I was making these, rather than creeping on the moirails.

Karkat stormed into the kitchen, followed by Gamzee. I blinked innocently at them.

"Yeeees?" I asked, smashing a brick of butter into some sugar. He glared at me.

"What the hell were you doing down there, forest-faced creep?" he snarled at me. I raised an eyebrow.

"Oh? What are you talking about? I'm making cookies!" I said, trying to smile innocently while not start snickering. I finally began to mix the butter and sugars together, now that the butter had been sufficiently smashed.

"I could hear you, you shitty stair stain…" he muttered. I giggled at him.

"Oh, that was… Patty, the ghost. She's my ghost identical twin and she haunts the basement," I lied, pulling my poker face. He looked at me.

"Seriously?" he said, obviously telling it was a lie. I glanced over to the right—the one giveaway that I was lying. I then quit trying to say it was a ghost and tried something else.

"Get out of my kitchen, you frothy dismal-dreaming lout!" I snapped a quick Shakespearean insult at him and raised my spoon menacingly. Surprisingly, he backed up. Gamzee merely laughed.

"Oh yeah? Well, you're a rocked propelled spaz maggot springloaded up the ass of a psychedelic fucking freakout weasel on idiot drugs!" he snapped back. I grinned; insulting children was _so_ much fun.

"Really, Mr. My-Last-Name-Is-A-Treatment-For-Prostate-Cancer?" I said, pulling some random Troll-name-trivia. He frowned at me, blushing.

"Is that the best your idiotic pink monkey brain could come up with? Or do I need to spoon feed your thinkpan with the suffering of a thousand wrigglers up to their nooks in festering discharge from your dismay fluid sacs?" he retorted. I made a face.

"Eww, great mental image there, mud-livered scrotumhog!" I snapped back, pulling another insult out of thin air. Now he was confused.

"What the actual fuck is a scrotum?" he replied. I blushed.

"It goes on the same level as one-holed metallic liquid carrying devices that may or may not have a handle! Now shut up and get outta my kitchen, you shovel-holed nipplesucker!" I snapped at him, trying to fling as many insults at him as possible. I noted, in the back of my mind, that during this whole exchange Gamzee had been barely holding himself up using the doorframe, his thin frame shaking with laughter.

Karkat responded oh-so-maturely by walking out and flipping me off as he went. I shrugged.

"No cookies for him, then."

As it went, I _did_ let him have cookies… although, it was right after I had pulled them off of the cookie tray and they were still blisteringly hot.

But after, I had settled to awkwardly fiddling with the hem of my olive green knit turtleneck while sitting on the couch, in between Gamzee and Karkat.

Gamzee had settled to simply flopping there like a wet noodle and staring off into space, a vague smile on his face.

Wait, that rhymed; were his random bouts of slam poetry rubbing off on me?

Anyhow, Karkat was facing the other direction, muttering to himself.

I sighed, tired of putting up with the awkward near-silence. "That's it, we're watching a movie."

"None of your nooksucking human movies are any good; we're watching _In which a lowblood and a highblood fall deeply into a matespriteship, even though said highblood's moirail deems this a terrible idea and_—" I cut him off by covering his mouth with my hand.

"Dude, if it has any more romance in it than 'Person likes person, but person number two is in a relationship but their spouse-or-whatever is cheating' and stuff like that, then I'm labeling it as a drama and I hate those; all the human ones have the same plot… action movies are so much better!" I said before taking my hand off of his mouth and rubbed it on my pants. He made a face and wiped his hand on his sleeve. "But before I go off and put _Braveheart_ in, what do you wanna watch, Gamzee?"

"MiRaClEs…" he quietly said, still quite stoned.

"Umm… alright, _Braveheart_ it is…" I said, quickly walking over to the television and putting in the movie and turning on the set.

After getting past all of the previews, Karkat turned to look at me.

"What's this stupid human movie about, anyway?" he asked, bored. I grinned.

"Weeell, you guys _probably_ don't have a Troll version of this—since it puts rebellion in a good light—but it's about the Scots trying to rebel from the English around… ehh… eight hundred years ago? Hint: they don't succeed."

After watching the movie—and seeing Karkat mutter over how _stupid_ human romance was—the movie finished.

"Best. Movie. Ever." I said, turning off the TV. Karkat rolled his eyes.

"The only thing _I_ don't get is why that human—Wallace?—had to set his matespriteship with that other human at night, seeing as how the rest of the stupid movie was all about stuff being during the day." Karkat said, draping his head over the arm of the couch. I grimaced.

"The English lords took the right of First Night, since, after people get married, they consummate their marriage and, um, yeah, the English noblepeople sorta _took_ the brides and…" I trailed off, as I could see Karkat's eyes widening in horror.

"God; humans are messed up…" he muttered. I nodded.

"Umm, on that note, who wants lunch?" I finally said, getting up. Karkat hunched over into himself.

"Not hungry…" he muttered quietly. I rolled my eyes at his strategy; it _had_ been one I had used on my parents when I was around his age.

"Well, fine, suit yourself—I _was_ going to offer you one of my ultra-awesome grilled cheese sandwiches, but since you're apparently _not hungry_, I guess I _could_ throw some _deadly_ nightshade into your lap and you'd be fine…" I giggled, walking over to the kitchen. "Hey, Gamzee, you wanna sammich?"

"Sure, that'd be motherfuckin' amazing, sister," he said, tilting his head back at an awkward angle to look at me. I giggled a bit more—he looked so silly!

After Gamzee and I had eaten lunch, Karkat finally giving in around halfway through us eating, I leaned back in my chair, stretching. _Other people around… and I was just as bored when I lived alone_… I thought, pushing some of my hair out of my eyes.

Karkat was still gnawing at his sandwich, pausing occasionally to glare at me. I raised an eyebrow at him.

"Geez, I wonder who woke up on the wrong side of the crate today," I muttered sarcastically before getting up and heading to my room. I slouched into my room, boredly kicking the door closed behind me.

I could try and say my room was very plain, but that would be a lie; I had painted all of the walls black and splattered random colors of paint onto the wall behind my large, fluffy bed with black and gray blankets. On another wall, I had chalked a few pictures of characters from Homestuck; they weren't very good, and I usually refused to show it to anybody else or make comments on it. On the third wall, around my large windows, I had put together a rather-small shipping wall of Homestuck characters, my friends, and myself. The old square with my ex had a rather heavy red "X" going through it; I'd need to clear that off so that I could start shipping something else there. The fourth wall was mainly taken up with my closet's sliding door and the door to the bathroom, so I hadn't done anything particularly interesting there. Across the room from where my bathroom was, there was my rather-average computer sitting on a rather plain desk. Boring.

The floor of my room was strewn with papers and articles of clothing, along with my ukulele, tenor saxophone, guitar, and some other instruments. I had been a very musically-oriented child, but I had given that up with high-school.

Deciding not to go on my computer, I flopped onto my bed. _Urgh…_ _there's quite literally nothing to do…_ I thought before walking over to my window. I peered outside; there was a thin gloss of snow and ice over everything—not enough to be fun, but enough to be an annoyance and not go outside for a walk or to go for a drive.

I wandered over to my computer and turned it on, hearing some faint arguing from downstairs. _Despite being rather grumpy, Karkat's supposed to be really mature… so he won't wreck my house or let Gamzee wreck it…_ I thought, smiling, before going to click on my account for my computer.

And the power went out.

Lousy circuit.

I sighed before getting up from my computer chair and heading back downstairs after I grabbed my laptop from a drawer in my desk. _Hopefully that wasn't because they messed with my electricity… stuff's expensive…_ I thought, stuffing my free hand into my pocket as I headed back down the stairs. I quickly noticed that Karkat had cleaned up everything from his crate and presumably taken it downstairs.

I walked down the stairs into the basement, this time not caring if I was interrupting a feelings-jam. Besides, didn't they just have one earlier this morning?

As it was, they were sitting on opposite sides of the room from each other, facing the wall, on their computers. I sighed; of course.

Seeing how they didn't notice me walk in, or they were deigning to ignore me, I sat on the bottom step and opened my laptop.

As I didn't have power, I didn't expect there to be any wi-fi, but I checked anyway. _What the… "Team Adorabloodthirsty"?!_ I stared at the wi-fi before glancing at the two trolls. _I'm just gonna guess Karkat's a walking wi-fi system and roll with it…_ I finally thought before attempting to enter the system.

**Password:**

Hmm.

Great.

_Let's see… wi-fi passwords can't be over twenty characters in length, so… let's try… urgh, I don't know…_

I finally gave up and stared at the little text box before giving up and going to play on minesweeper. _Who cares… it's just a… stupid… wi-fi… system… urgh…_ I clicked on the little boxes furiously, almost immediately getting blown up.

After attempting to play minesweeper, I eventually pulled up the word document that contained the rather-terrible romance novel I was writing. Romance was hard to write, thus it made good practice.

Except I was utterly terrible at writing it.

Oh well.

While I was busy trying to figure out how I should make the next scene in the second date go, I failed to notice the fact that Karkat had noticed me sitting on the stairs. He put down his laptop (husktop?) and walked over to me, avoiding the horns strewn about. I was intently working on a bit that was annoying me, my mouth screwed up into an almost-grimace.

"Hey." He said simply. I flinched as I looked up at him, surprised.

"Uh," was all I could say, looking around awkwardly. He rolled his eyes before sitting next to me and looking at my terrible romance novel. Karkat gently scooted the laptop off of my lap and onto his before scrolling to the top and reading it. He raised an eyebrow at it at some points, snickering at others. I fidgeted and blushed next to him for the full nearly-hour it took for him to read it. Once he had finished he pushed the computer back to me and snickered a bit.

"So that's what stupid human romance is like? Wow, no wonder John is a fucking retard," he said, tilting his head a little. I simply closed the laptop and crossed my arms over it.

"Yeah, well, I'm not that good of a romance writer, aight? Geez, have you ever even read somethin' like Romeo and Juliet? Or, something like "In which two young adolescent trolls fall deeply in love, despite the fact that their hivestems are at war, fill buckets, and die, while four other random trolls die"?" I responded, rolling my eyes and putting air quotes around it. "It's supposed to be the pinnacle of lovey-dovey devotion, but it's about a couple of stupid hormonal teenagers."

Karkat laughed. Like, an actual laugh. Like how a normal person would laugh. I stared at him in amazement. After he noticed how I was looking at him, he quickly stopped laughing and started to glare at me.

"Well, what the fuck is it?" he snarled at me. I grinned at him.

"You laughed; I didn't actually think it was possible." I said, leaning against the wall of the stairwell. He rolled his eyes and scoffed.

"Oh yeah?" He began before beginning to lecture me about how he would laugh more if everyone wasn't so 'goddamned stupid!'. I rolled my eyes and glanced at Gamzee. It actually looked like he was sleeping at his computer, how cute…

"Hey. Hey! Are you even listening to me, or are your auricular sponge clots so fucking messed up that they somehow interpreted my voice as the sound of a hoofbeast?" Karkat's voice cut through me zoning out. I leaned back and blinked rapidly.

"Wha," I said simply turning to look at Karkat. He pulled a facepalm. "Were you talking to me?" Cue double facepalm.

"Urgh… just… why did you come down here?" he finally said.

"Oh! That's cuz the power went out; by the way, why is there wi-fi down here?" I said, finally remembering. Karkat rolled his eyes.

"What, do you want to use my internet, or do you want something else?" he asked. I smiled a bit at him.

"Can I use your internet _pleeeeeeaaaase_ Karkat?" I asked, tilting my head and batting my eyelashes at him. He facepalmed a third time.

"Whatever, give me your computer," he muttered before pulling my poor laptop off of my lap. He flicked open the top and quickly went into the wireless connections. After double clicking on the "Team Adorabloodthirsty" wi-fi, Karkat pressed the Caps Lock key and typed in, really slowly, "BRACHYURA". The infraorder that all crabs fit into. Interesting.

After he had typed that in, Karkat gave me back my laptop and walked back to his abandoned husktop. My computer connected to the wifi, and, upon closing the window, I found a new icon on my computer.

Pesterchum.

Oh boy.

I double clicked on the shortcut, mindlessly worrying my lower lip. The application popped up and prompted for a handle. I leaned on one hand, thinking boredly. _Hmm… basically another username… I wonder what to use…_

I finally decided to start with the adjective "cynical". Lots of people had described me using this word; heck, I'd even describe myself with it! Now a noun…

After thinking for a few minutes (_Musician? Figurehead?_), I eventually decided to search for a random noun. The one I ended up with? Success. No thank you; I clicked the "Random" button again. This time? Bra. _Urgh…_ I thought, going through a few more words. Finally, I got one that I even came close to liking. _Matchmaker… perfect…_ I typed in the Chumhandle corpseMatchmaker.

Now to choose a color.

Now I could have been vague and go with my favorite color—ice blue—but I decided to act like a proper Homestucker and use my eyecolor.

Yeah, my freakishly dark green eyes.

How… _delightful_.

Upon doing this, I finally went to the basic page of Pesterchum. _Now what…_

Unbeknownst to me, Karkat was on Trollian, predictably trolling Gamzee. However, he couldn't help but notice when a new name appeared in his Chumproll. _Who the hell is this… "cynicalMatchmaker"?_

And, with that, he began to attempt to troll them within a stinking exhale of their life.

**-carcinoGeneticist [CG] began trolling cynicalMatchmaker [CM] at 14:32-**

CG: YOU WORTHLESS IDIOT.

CM: wat

CM: karkat? :/

CG: HOW THE FUCK DO YOU KNOW MY NAME, YOU STUPID PINK MONKEY?

CM: uhhhhh… i'm kinda sitting like twenty feet from you… :I

CG: WHAT.

Karkat turned immediately to look at me; I smiled shyly and waved.

CM: yup :D

CG: GODDAMMIT. WHY ARE YOU IN MY CHUMP ROLL?

CM: uh

CM: i would say magic, but due to the circumstances i guess i'll have to say… shenanigans? :/

CG: UGH; THIS IS SO FUCKING ANNOYING.

CM: says the one doing allcaps…

CM: even i know that's the most overused typing… thing.

CG: I GIVE UP.

CM: i win; the human troll succeeds :D

CG: WAIT, WHAT? "HUMAN", NOTE THE ENCLOSURE TALONS, TROLL?

CM: troll is a noun here; you didn't know?

CG: WHAT, DO I LOOK LIKE I KNOW EVERYTHING ABOUT YOUR STINKING CULTURE?

CM: … no; i /was/ going to explain it, but since you were so rude, i guess i won't then :P

CG: WHATEVER. I DIDN'T NEED TO KNOW ANYWAY.

CM: :P

CM: so, since it's only like early afternoon, idk what to do for the rest of the day ._.

CM: since i kinda have to watch you guys now, i can't go job hunting like what i did 'couple weeks ago

CM: unless you're willing to sit alone in the basement here :u

CG: DO WE LOOK LIKE WRIGGLERS WHO NEED A FUCKING MOIRAIL?

CG: WE'LL BE FINE IF YOU GO… HUNTING.

CM: blah

CM: and here i was hoping for an excuse from doing actual work ;-;

CG: GO FUCKING SEARCHING, …

CG: WHAT'S YOUR NAME?

CM: erin liam vandelheim

CM: call me "that chick with a name that sounds identical to a boys name" and i will cause you pain

CG: I WASN'T PLANNING TO.

CG: STOP WASTING TIME, NOOKSNIFFER.

**-carcinoGeneticist [CG] ceased trolling cynicalMatchmaker [CM]-**

I glanced over at Karkat, who was now furiously typing at Gamzee, before sighing and getting up, holding my laptop slightly away from my body.

When did he become the mature one?

I walked back up into rest of the house, before remembering why I had gone down into the basement in the first place. I ended up summing up all of my rage-induced feelings into a simple facepalm.

And, with that facepalm, the power came back on.

Just my luck.

**A/N And that chapter's a wrap! :3**

**Some people may wonder why I didn't update for a long while; I blame procrastination, band, and AP classes. _**

**I still own nothing but Erin and the plotline (kinda).**

**BOW DOWN TO HUSSIE'S GLORIOUS LIPS OR FACE THE CONSEQUENCES!**


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